


A King in the Darkness

by Kalamos



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Asexuality, Blow Jobs, Dream Pack, Drugs, Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, M/M, Self-Harm, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-09
Updated: 2015-09-09
Packaged: 2018-04-19 22:11:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4762892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalamos/pseuds/Kalamos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>They crash Skov's and Swan's dorm room, an impossible geometrical shape of five boys spread over two double beds, and Jiang could easily have crossed the hallway to his own dorm room, but he prefers to curl up next to them with his nose in the hollow of Swan's knee.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>Kavinsky kicks him into the side. "You're not fucking five, you piece of shit."</em>
  <br/>
  <em>"Fuck off, K," Jiang drawls.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>"Come on, man, let him," Skov murmurs. He's too tired even to insult him. "You never had a sleepover?"</em>
  <br/>
  <em>There's a long pause until Prokopenko nudges him and whispers, "K? You still awake?"</em>
  <br/>
  <em>"What."</em>
  <br/>
  <em>"Did you really never have a sleepover?"</em>
</p><p>Kavinsky and his pack of dogs a.k.a. The Dream Pack being cute puppies & sometimes violent dogs. Mind the warnings, it's not fluffy. (At least not all of it.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	A King in the Darkness

**Author's Note:**

> This is more a series of drabbles than an actual story, but they're compliant and in a roughly chronological order, so I guess you can read them either way.

The place by Kavinsky's side had to be earned. It was part admiration, part fear, part utter disgust. Except for Proko, who had come first and had nothing but admiration for anyone. Swan often thought he was like a puppy demanding to be kicked.

"You don't understand," Jiang said one day after they had gotten high sitting on the roof of his Supra. "When he says 'I'm gonna kill you,' we hand him the gun."

"Sounds like Stockholm syndrome," Swan mused.

"You don't understand," Jiang repeated.

* * *

Love never felt like a religion to him and he doesn't get why other people feel that way. He doesn't get why Swan feels that way. Swan on his knees wanting so desperately to please him and if there's a single person in this world he can stand it's Swan but his body won't move, won't activate whatever is necessary to do this. Love was never a religion, it was always a power or an excuse or a really shitty reason to stay.

"Hey, Jiang," Swan says and looks up to him. That is his turn to pull away and put his jeans back on. "Jiang - look - I'm sorry -"

"Fuck you," Jiang interrupts. That's what he hates about this. How they all assume it's their fault. Swan looks like he's about to say more, but Jiang turns away. "Please just go."

If he could just lie next to him and watch him breathe. But then he’d have to placate him for what happened, have to explain himself and Swan won't him believe anyway, no one ever believes him as if it was them who had lived in his body for seventeen years and not him. He doesn't notice when Swan finally leaves, he just stares at the blank wall, trying not to think. Letting his thoughts run wild right now wouldn't do any good.

* * *

He doesn't listen to his own advice, so an hour later he's on the streets, trying to outrace his mind at 100 miles per hour. He should never have let Swan get that close. They were perfect before. Kissing was even nice sometimes. Everything else -

His foot presses down on the gas pedal and he watches the number on the dashboard go up, up, up - the speed is magic flowing through his veins, the floor vibrating under his feet, adrenaline kicking in at every curve. Out here, he's a king.

When he sees headlights in the distance he finally slows down. It's a sinking feeling, everything suddenly real again, everything bland except his heart rushing with the memory of blurred lights and the windshield eating away the center lines.

He spends a night without sleep. The speakers in his dorm room spit out Korean hip hop until someone bangs at the other side of the wall, willing him to be quiet, so he transfers it to headphones. The point is not having to think because his mind never stands still. Gin & Tonic helps a lot, one of Kavinsky's pills helps, too, and yet when he drives to Aglionby the next morning, he still hasn't slept.

He shares Physics with Swan after lunch break, which is why he makes a point of beating him up instead of getting food.

Swan and his roommate, Skov, lounge in front of the cafeteria, sipping coffee, and Jiang feels a sudden pang of jealousy at the casual way Skov has slung his arm around Swan's shoulder.

Jiang approaches them. "Swan," he says, "I need a word." Swan looks at him defiantly, Skov's stare is openly hostile. "Fuck off, Jiang. Take your games elsewhere."

Jiang blushes furiously. "Go fuck yourself, Skov. I wasn't talking to you."

"He's right, actually," Swan says quietly as he looks at the floor.

Jiang snorts. He didn't fucking ask for this. His throat tightens and aches, but he manages, "Okay, just do what your tiny lover boy says. Maybe that's why you didn't get me to-"

Before he can say anything else, Swan's fist lands in his face, half chin half mouth. It's absurdly well placed. It also feels absurdly good. "Is that all you got?" Jiang spits out a mouthful of blood.

Swan doesn't answer, doesn’t move, he just shakes his head. Jiang wants to grab his shoulders and shake him and maybe make his head collide with something hard, but he manages to restrict himself to giving him a shove and flipping Skov the finger before he walks away.

Now he has to stare at Swan's back all through Physics. The way his shoulders move under the white Aglionby crested shirt. The light that catches on the tiny fluffy hairs at the back of his neck.

His stomach growls and he remembers that he didn't eat anything since last afternoon, before Swan and racing and being up all night. He was too distracted or too worried or both.

And it's fine until the teacher calls him out. "Mr. Jiang, it would be a great pleasure to all of us if you could take a detour to the snack machine and treat yourself to a chocolate bar."

And for the second time today, Jiang blushes, deep. "I certainly don't mean to distract this class," he hisses, and he takes his books and leaves with no intention to come back, even though it will earn him a letter from the school and God knows he has enough of these to renovate his dorm room with them.

He skips the rest of the school day, too, since he's already at it, and stays in his room instead to take out his anger in a gory video game instead of on other people. And he doesn't eat anything either because by now, the thought of it makes him sick already and he hates his body a bit less when there's no food in it.

* * *

Skov disliked all of them - at first. Jiang for hurting Swan, Swan for enjoying it, Kavinsky for being Kavinsky, that careless explosive creature with no respect for life or death.

Prokopenko was a different story.

Skov had hated group work back in Florida and he hated it here at Aglionby, even more so because he was the fucking new student and everyone was already in pairs when he still told himself that it wasn't a big deal and he wasn't going to freak out.

Everyone except a tall, beaten-up looking boy who sat at his desk, doodling over his World History notes as if it was the most important thing in the world right now. Skov caught a stiff glance from the teacher and hurried to gather his stuff and flop down across from the tall boy.

"Looks like we're the only ones without a partner," he said, trying to sound casual.

The boy looked up. "Fuck it. I didn't realize we're an even number now."

"Well, it's not my fucking fault, you know," Skov retorted before he could stop himself and the boy flashed him a vile grin.

"Actually, it is."

He had an accent Skov couldn't quite place.

Skov became aware of the stares then and tried not to notice the other students' mixture of dislike and fear. He cleared his throat and said, "I'm Skov."

"That's a funny name - Skov. Where are you from?" The boy gave a low, throaty laugh, but since Skov didn't know why, he just shrugged and replied, "Florida."

"Florida," the boy repeated mockingly. There - the R sound. He sounded like a villain in a James Bond movie. Was that a Russian accent?

"How about you?"

The boy gazed at him for a long moment. "We're wasting our time. This project isn't going to do itself."

They worked in silence, comparing their findings every now and then in low whispers punctured by awkward pauses. Skov glanced at his project partner a few times; his sickly looking face, so pale it was almost green, the dark circles under his eyes, nose curved in a way that indicated it had been broken - maybe even more than once.

When the bell rang and the other boy closed his files, Skov craned his neck to read the name on his notepad: Prokopenko.

"You could've just asked, you know," Prokopenko smirked and seemed to enjoy the startled look on Skov's face.

"I didn't mean to-"

"See you," he interrupted and it didn't sound like he was looking forward to it.

* * *

They had studied after class one day, since they shared World History. They were discussing the bombing of Pearl Harbor when Proko's phone rang. Skov caught a glimpse of the "K" next to the ringing phone symbol before Proko picked it up.

"What's up, bastard?" And then, "be there in ten."

"I thought we were studying," Skov pointed out. Proko shrugged, "Then we'll study sometime else."

"Why do you always listen when he rings? You and Jiang? Like you're his dogs."

Proko looked at him with that crease between his eyebrows and squinted eyes. " _Не собаки, но братья._ "

He always spat out these violent sounding words.

“What?”

" _Nie zabaki, no bratya._ It means 'mind your own fucking business and don't ask stupid questions,'" Proko hissed before he got up and gathered his things.

Skov could tell from his look that this was very much not what he had said. "Whatever. Fuck off."

Proko flipped him the finger as he left the studying room.

It riled Skov. He couldn't say what it was about Proko, but he made him feel as if he were not a student at an elite private school, but a child asking question after question to an adult who had grown tired of giving honest answers. And he hated how he enjoyed his too pale skin, his hollowed-out eyes, the hint of freckles on his cheeks. He didn't have a problem with being gay. He had a problem with liking someone who looked like that.

So instead of compiling a list of reasons for the Pearl Harbor situation, he took out his phone and searched the web for Russian insults so that next time, he'd have something to throw at Proko.

* * *

When someone knocks on the door the last person Jiang expects is Swan.

He's like a dog that got kicked and comes crouching back and it's so pathetic that you just want to kick it again.

"What the fuck," Jiang greets him.

"Yeah, what the fuck," Swan spits. Even standing still, he seems like something moving, restless hands and shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "Like, what the fuck are you think you're doing? I know we're cool and we don't talk, but-" "That's right. We don't talk. So shut the fuck up, will you?"

Swan looks like he doesn't believe what's happening right now, all arched eyebrows and open mouth. "Seriously, Jiang, this is not-"

Jiang shuts him up with a kiss on his pretty mouth. Swan mumbles words against his lips but his hands get tangled Jiang’s hair and his protests melt into a moan as Jiang slides a hand between his legs.

"This is all I want to hear from you right now," he whispers.

"I fucking hate you," Swan manages.

"Good." Jiang drags him into his dorm now, kicking the door shut.

"I hope you enjoy what I'm doing, because I don't feel like this any time, ever."

"What?" Swan pants between two moans.

Jiang shoves him onto the bed and climbs on top of him. Swan likes to be hurt, he can hurt him. Swan likes to be kissed, he can kiss him. His hands are at Swan’s neck, in his hair, down his chest – the way he has seen it in movies and all those late night porn videos that didn’t do anything to him.

"The closest I get to being aroused is when I sit in my car and the speedometer climbs over 150 mph," he mumbles when his mouth is close to Swan’s ear.

"That's - oh fucking God - that's not the same!" Swan is moving beneath him.

"Well I wouldn't fucking know the difference!" Jiang lets his hand glide over the bulge in Swan’s jeans, feels the other boy flinch.

"Jiang, no - oh, fuck - please stop."

Swan doesn't look like he wants him to stop, with his eyes half closed in pleasure and his mouth a willing cave. But since he said stop, Jiang stops.

The other boy needs a moment to catch his breath, which Jiang uses to appreciate the aesthetic of someone halfway to an orgasm.

"I don't want you to do this. Not if you don't feel the same." Swan sits up with his chest still heaving.

Regret and shame hit immediately. It was fucking clear he wouldn’t understand. Jiang gulps down the embarrassment, shrugs and his voice is too sweet when he answers, "Whatever makes you happy, sweetheart," and his gaze is cold as he turns away.

"Oh, wow. Is that how - I fucking should have listened to Skov. You're the grossest piece of shit around here, you know that?"

Jiang swirls around, ready to fight, but Swan already got up and staggers backwards now. "Don't ever touch me again, okay. Just - fuck you. Or don't. Whichever floats your boat." He leaves fast, slamming the door behind him.

"And don't fucking come back!" Jiang yells after him, then kicks the door for good measure.

* * *

The Sunday after his fight with Proko, Skov was woken by the vibration of his phone against his rib bones. He must've fallen asleep browsing.

The text was from Proko - an image, actually, showing a street map of Henrietta and its surroundings with a red line indicating a route to God knew where, accompanied by GPS data.

"see u in ten," the message said.

Skov ran his hands through his hair, groaning. Did that mean Proko wanted to continue their World History project? There was no way he'd get there in ten minutes.

But since he was already awake and had nothing better to do anyway, he got up, snatched a coffee to go from the cafeteria downstairs and got into his car.

It became clear very quickly that this wasn't about school. The route led to an abandoned fairground and the satnav showed there was no trace of civilization in a one mile radius around it. Curiosity kept him going, though, and when he finally arrived, there were two cars parked on the dusty field, blaring some bastardization of music through the open windows.

"Where's Proko?" he called as he got out.

"How about 'good morning,'" someone yelled back.

Skov stayed silent as unease spread in his stomach. The Toyota Supra belonged to Jiang, he’d seen it often enough. And the other car -

The door of the white Mitsubishi opened to spit out a scrawny boy with spiky dark hair and a rather ridiculous golden necklace. Kavinsky.

"Catch!" Something flew into Skov's direction, then shattered on the hood of his Mazda when he didn’t move.

"Fucking hell," he cursed as he brushed the glass shards off his shirt. Judging by the smell, the liquid running down his windshield was beer.

Kavinsky came closer. "You need to be faster."

"I don't fucking need anything," Skov retorted, licking blood off his fingers.

Kavinsky examined him, or at least it looked like it, because there was no being sure as long as he kept those sunglasses on. "Proko's up in D.C., visiting his _babushka_." He spit down in front of Skov's feet. "Going to church. Confessing all his sins."

"Why would he-"

"And all his dirty thoughts," Kavinsky added. "You keep your hands off him. You don't want him going to hell, do you?"

Some sort of understanding formed itself in Skov's mind. Was Kavinsky implying that Proko had a thing about him? That couldn’t be true, right? "I don't follow," he said.

Kavinsky grinned wide. "I think you do. Second try." From the back pocket of his jeans, he produced another bottle of beer that he shoved into Skov’s hand.

“However, I think Proko likes looking at your face,” Kavinsky closed the remaining distance between them and ran his fingers down Skov’s cheekbone, “so I won’t tell you to stay away. It’s all of us or nothing.”

Skov leaned back, escaping the touch. “What makes you think I want that?”

The other boy smiled.

* * *

Skov slams down a leather bound bible on Proko's desk. "I read the fucking thing. It doesn't say -- there's nothing."

Proko gives him a cool look. "I will tell you something to think about," he says, tapping the cover. "Books and religion are not the same thing. Write me an essay. At least ten pages. I want them by Monday right here on this desk."

"Or you could just, you know, explain your fucking problem to me," Skov hisses.

"I don't owe you an explanation. Educate yourself. I heard of his curious thing named 'Google-'"

"You can be the worst kind of asshole, you know that?"

"I'm glad it still works," Proko replies calmly.

* * *

The first time Prokopenko fell in love, it didn't end well.

First loves seldom do.

He was thirteen and let himself get felt up behind the bicycle racks at school, hungry for a kiss he never got, and the boy was fifteen and laughing and calling him a fag.

He had to look up the word when he got home. It sounded all wrong, this was not what he was, or was he? He went to church every Sunday, praying silently with his _бабушка_ sitting next to him.

And yet the boy came back, calling him names, guiding his mouth down his chest, and Proko felt guilty for knowing it's wrong and wanting it anyway, and when the boy said at least he didn't have to hear his stupid accent as long as his mouth was occupied, Proko only thought that he deserved every cruel word thrown at him.

The boy promised he wouldn't tell, but he did.

At first, Proko didn't care. There was a lecture from the principal and a humiliating slap in the face from his father and his _бабушка_ saying they should have stayed in St. Petersburg because America was a rotten and godless place.

Then came the notes and the dirty pictures in his locker, more name-calling, people tripping him up in the hallway, unknown fluids sticking to his books. His father said he brought it on himself, and Proko knew - God, he knew - and yet he wished he could get out of his skin just for long enough to breathe.

It took a few more weeks and a trip to the hospital until his father let him transfer to another school, and Prokopenko started in a small town down in Virginia, bandages hidden under the long-sleeved uniform shirt that said _Aglionby_ on the crest.

* * *

Proko watches the blood flow in a tiny trail down his ribcage. He didn't cut very deep, even though his fingers itch to do it, and then pull the skin apart and look what's inside. What kind of feeling that would be. But there'd probably too much blood to see anything at all, and he's afraid he'll be sent to the hospital again. Last time, it went into his papers as a suicide attempt, and they made him go to the school counsellor.

Kavinsky and Jiang don't say anything as long as he can still drive a car - the way no one lectures Jiang for not eating and K for having coke for breakfast. They're nothing but a bunch of sad losers trying to stay alive. Or at least he is.

Kavinsky calls. "Get your ass over here, shithead." This is his version of being polite, but without the fake smiling. So Proko swipes an old shirt over the wound and puts a band-aid on the cut, similar to the three others already plastered below, gets dressed and heads out.

They meet at the fairground, as always. Jiang is already there and in the bright afternoon sun, the bruise on his face looks especially garish. Kavinsky stands with his back to them, holding something in his hands. The sudden noise it makes lets Proko realize it's a gun.

"Weird," he comments. Kavinsky turns around and aims the gun at Proko, smiling. "Hey, baby boy. How's the _бабушка_?"

" _Хорошо_ ," Proko replies unconcerned and walks over to Jiang, reaching out to touch his chin. "That's a nice color your face is today. Is this some weird Korean thing?"

"It's a thing people like you get when they ask too many questions," Jiang answers calmly and slaps his hand away. Proko gives him a dirty grin before he turns around to Kavinsky, who's shooting a pattern into the hood of his Evo.

Proko frowns. "You really fucking don't care about this thing."

"I really fucking don't care about anything," Kavinsky replies coldly, and Proko thinks, _as long as it's not white and powdered_.

"So what is it you wanted to show us?"

Kavinsky will make them ask at least five times more - teasing people is one of his favorite past times - so Proko might as well get over with it.

"Not so fast, baby boy. Miracles take time."

Proko snorts and holds out a hand to Jiang, who places a cigarette into his palm. "Right. Time. Isn't that the curious thing we could use to study for the Math's test tomorrow?"

"Your way of thinking is too mundane, Proko. Did you ever shoot a gun? Except your own?" Kavinsky's gaze flickers to Proko's crotch for a second.

"Fuck you," Proko replies with the cigarette in the corner of his mouth and throws the lighter at Kavinsky - who is by his side very fast, shoving him against Jiang's Supra with the gun at Proko's throat.

"I tell you who I'm going to fuck. But you won't like it."

Proko shrugs, the barrel digging into his skin. "I don't care. You can fuck whoever you like."

The smile he receives for that is full of malice. "Yeah?" Kavinsky leans in closer until his lips almost touch Proko's ear. "What about Skov?"

"What? No. Fuck you. Why would that fucking bother me?" Proko shoves him away, but Kavinsky only laughs and shakes his head. "I've seen you. It's awful. It's like watching a fast car lose control and you just know it's going to end in burned rubber and pieces of metal digging into your skull." His index finger taps Proko's chest. "Listen to me. That's what's going to happen."

Proko finally finds it in him to laugh like this is the most absurd thing he's heard all week.

"Right. You got me. Jealous?" He bats his lashes in some sort of fake flirting. Kavinsky turns away to shoot another bullet - windshield this time. "Maybe."

And this time something in Proko turns cold because he's not sure anymore how much of their conversation is still meaningless banter.

"Are you done flirting?" The look on Jiang's face is half bored and half impatient as he empties the beer bottle. "K, I think that car's gone. How about a little Molotov fun?"

A look of approval flashes over Kavinsky's face before he says, "That depends. How much do you trust me?"

Unconcerned, Jiang shrugs. "That depends."

* * *

This is how Prokopenko dies:

A dare.

The shot is still ringing in his ears even as the pain sets in. In that last second, he doubts, and the feeling is worse than anything he's ever experienced in his eighteen years. He has always known he wants to live. It just hasn't been that crystal clear until now.

The worst thing is the flickering in Kavinsky's eyes. Is it fear? Sadness? Or simply curiosity?

Prokopenko dies wondering.

* * *

And he wakes up, just like that.

* * *

Jiang looks at the two Prokos and it's hard to believe this is happening. One dead; one strangely, wonderfully alive. "You're a fucking God," he whispers in the few moments his brain doesn't work.

Kavinsky sports a horrible, horrible smile. "Am I really? When I killed him in the first place?"

* * *

A dreamer and a dream creature and Jiang, oddly left out. A part of him wanted to beg Kavinsky to kill him too, and another part was in awe with disgust of what he had done.

He lays awake at night with the question running on repeat in his mind, and it's even worse because he knows Kavinsky doesn't waste a second thought on something like that. He's too busy destroying things or dreaming them up.

* * *

Proko has known Kavinsky when they were just scrawny kids with too many bruises and not enough dreams. Maybe they still are, Proko muses, lying next to Kavinsky, their skin the same tone of green against the stark April sun.

Kavinsky holds the cigarette above his face and blinks into the sky.

Last night, they buried Proko’s old body.

They don't talk. Proko came from inside Kavinsky's head. They know all of each other's secrets.

* * *

Jiang calls Swan because he doesn't know who else.

"It's fucking two in the morning." Swan sounds just-woken-up.

"Hey Swan," Jiang says.

"Jiang?"

"It's me."

"Oh fuck." It doesn't sound like a curse.

"Sorry I woke you up."

There's silence because they both don't know what to say.

"Can I talk to you?" Jiang says.

"I'm already awake, ain't I?"

"I mean... really. Face to face."

There's a pause and Jiang imagines Swan with his slender frame shrugging his shoulders. "Okay."

* * *

They live in the same building, two floors apart from each other, and yet they meet outside of Henrietta. Getting into your own car, inhaling the familiar smell of leather and coffee (Jiang) or weed and disinfectant (Swan), watching the street lights blur as they vanish in the rear view mirror - it has a calming effect.

Except Jiang can't be calmed tonight.

"I didn't know who else to talk to," Jiang confesses, leaning against the still-warm hood of his car. Swan watches him, apparently not sure whether to come closer, but Jiang scoots to the side and that's enough of an invitation for Swan.

"What happened?" he asks as he settles down next to Jiang.

"It's hard to explain."

Swan nods.

They're silent for a while.

"It's really shitty of you, you know." Jiang almost doesn't hear him because Swan speaks so quietly.

"I know."

"No you don't. If you knew, you wouldn't have called in the first place."

Jiang doesn't answer.

"Like calling me wasn't bad enough. No. Go on and tell me I'm the last person you thought of. The replacement when nobody else answers his phone."

Jiang fishes a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and holds it out to Swan, then lights one for himself.

"You were actually the first person I thought of calling. And I didn't know if I should because you - "

He stops there and tries not to look at Swan because he fears that too many emotions will show on his face. And that will make everything worse.

"Because I... what?"

"Because you hate me." Jiang takes a deep drag from the cigarette. Feels how the smoke burns in his lungs.

"Is that what you think?"

This is not going where he wants it to. Discussing this complicated something that is between them right now - he doesn't know if he can.

So he just shrugs and Swan accepts it because Swan never argues with anything.

"You asked me about Kavinsky once."

After a few heartbeats, Swan says, "I remember."

Jiang nods. "You were right."

"I was right how?"

"We hand him the gun."

He feels Swan shiver beside him - maybe, just now, he realized someone died.

"Prokopenko?"

"He's... he's... well. Alive."

Swan stiffens next to him, waiting for him to continue.

Jiang leans back until he lies on the hood and stares into the star strewn sky. So many things he doesn't know. So many things he doesn't understand.

Swan crawls up next to him.

"You don't have to talk."

And Jiang considers not saying anything for a moment, but then he bursts out, "I really fucking like you a lot."

"Don't," Swan warns.

"I do. I'm sorry." Jiang closes his eyes.

He's not crying. He's not crying.

Okay, maybe he's crying.

Swan leaves silently.

* * *

_I really fucking like you a lot._

If there was someone treating Skov like that, he'd beaten them up a long time ago. Skov or his crush or both. And Swan knows all the reasons why it's wrong, why he should never talk to Jiang again, why he should keep a hundred feet distance from him and yet -

He likes the agony. An hour with Jiang is worth three days of heartache. And like a suicidal animal, he always listens when Jiang calls.

Was that how Jiang felt about Kavinsky?

 _Come on. Text me._ He stared at his phone but it didn't move.

"Swan? Why are you awake?" The voice sounded feeble.

"Go back to sleep, Skov." Swan turns around, shielding the glowing screen of his phone from Skov.

And after two sleepless hours, he calls Jiang, who picks up after the phone rings for what feels like an eternity.

He speaks very quietly so he won’t wake Skov.

"I like you too."

Jiang's voice is sleepy. "Swan." And then, "Good."

* * *

It’s hard to believe they can speak calmly now, because this was not how it started.

How it started was this:

"Thanks a fucking lot," Swan said and spit a mouthful of blood to the concrete ground. "I hope it made you feel all godly and heroic."

The Korean boy just gazed at him and stood perfectly still, even though he had just knocked out the two guys attacking Swan.

"Am I your charity case of the day?" he riled him further - he just wanted to see how far he could go, what it would take for the other boy to turn on him, too. "Or were you just looking for someone to punch? Because that's just miserable."

He stood up, brushing stones and glass shards off his hands. "Don't just stand there. Is that all you got?" Swan reached out to box the other guy lightly against his upper arm, and that was when a fist connected with his mouth, finally, and he felt the pain shoot through his jawbone and his lower lip split.

He smiled then, blood dripping down his chin.

"Jiang, you fucking piece of shit," someone called from inside a car. "Get your sorry little ass over here."

Jiang flipped him off without turning around.

"Come on. Do it again," Swan jeered, slightly turning his face to make it easier for Jiang.

The other boy began to smile. "Beg me," he said.

Swan grinned, stepping into his personal space, and whispered, "No way, fucker." It was possible he sprayed a few splashes of blood onto Jiang's face or his immaculate Aglionby uniform, but he wouldn't know, because he was already aim of knees and fists and on the ground again and his head collided with the concrete and if that was the only way he could be touched by someone like Jiang then he'd gladly endure it for the rest of his life.

It was over fast. Swan breathed heavily, and Jiang, who leaned over him, did too.

Then Jiang leaned forward and his tongue licked Swan's lips, in a gesture half tender, half animal, tasting the blood, before he got up again and brushed the dust off his uniform.

"Get in the car," he instructed with a look at him and started towards the white Mitsubishi.

* * *

Kavinsky is a king in the darkness and these people are his henchmen: Skov, small and dark, Swan, bruised and bright, skinny violent Jiang and Prokopenko, who is sort of dead and then sort of not. Everyone’s heard stories about them – some about drunk driving and spray-painting the school grounds, some about guns and trading drugs for sex, some about dead bodies in the forest.

* * *

Everyone knows Kavinsky the Legend - that drug-dealing coke-snorting bastard with a weakness for explosives and disaster. Only his pack knows Yosif Kavinsky, the boy eaten up by anger, who'd rather set the world on fire than watch it being ruined by someone else, with dreams bigger than he could handle.

Prokopenko's favorite Kavinsky is _drunk and stoned Kavinsky_ at four in the morning.

They crash Skov's and Swan's dorm room, an impossible geometrical shape of five boys spread over two double beds, and Jiang could easily have crossed the hallway to his own dorm room, but he prefers to curl up next to them with his nose in the hollow of Swan's knee.

Kavinsky kicks him into the side. "You're not fucking five, you piece of shit."

"Fuck off, K," Jiang drawls.

"Come on, man, let him," Skov murmurs. He's too tired even to insult him. "You never had a sleepover?"

There's a long pause until Prokopenko nudges him and whispers, "K? You still awake?"

"What."

"Did you really never have a sleepover?"

Kavinsky snorts. "Plenty."

"I can't sleep," Proko says. "Tell me about them."

So K turns around to face him, both of them tired but peaceable. And he tells him about how when he was young and relatives visited them and they didn't have enough beds for everyone, his mother dumped an armful of blankets on his bed and made all the kids sleep there, how he thought this was normal until the first time he slept at a friend's house and got sent to the guest room.

How the woman living in the other half of their apartment died one day and nobody cared so they used the extra space. How everyone knew how to climb fences and trees and windows at age four because no one just handed you the stuff you wanted. Sneak into the neighbor's garden to play on the rusty, brittle swing set. Wooden fences missing half of their planks. Their biggest treasure a half-deflated ball they kicked over the clothes line in the backyard.

How everything changed when his father began working in a certain sort of business and they moved to Jersey and suddenly there were no tiny rooms crammed with people anymore, only large houses that were dark and silent. No sleepovers, just a boy and a bottle of vodka.

"Do you miss it?"

Kavinsky flinches because he didn't think that Proko was still awake after all this rambling.

"Fuck, no."

And Proko just nods and smiles and takes his hand under the covers where no one will see. Because clearly he's still here, wedged between Proko and and Skov, instead of his own empty bedroom in a silent house.

* * *

It doesn't last.

It explodes into nothingness. Into fire. Into burned rubber and pieces of metal digging into skulls.

* * *

_After everything._

They're three boys on the burned ground of the Henrietta drag strip, passing around a joint under the relentless August sun. Coming here is torture, and yet this torture is better than the blankness.

They used to be a force of nature, a disaster, an explosion. But in the good way. Not like this.

* * *

Skov is fucking unbearable because he hasn't had a drink in three days. Jiang shoves a bottle of rum in his direction. "I can't look at your fucking face," he declares.

Skov shrugs and fills his coffee cup up with the brown liquid. Swan raises his eyebrows, but doesn’t say anything.

Compared to death, what matters?

It doesn't just kill your best friends, but also your idealism. It’s telling you: better live now, better abandon your principles, better grab at the happiness while it's yours to take.

So they’re having alcohol and pills for breakfast and walk the halls of Aglionby with two boys missing.

* * *

Swan still has Jiang. Swan still has Skov. Skov doesn’t talk anymore and Jiang is high all the time, which means they get along better now.

And he knows he should be sad, but there’s a voice whispering in his head:

_Let’s say you’re on a plane full of people you care about, and you find out that one of your best friends is a time bomb. Do you push them out of the door to save everyone else? Or do you go down with them?_

_And if they jump out of their own: won’t there be a tiny part of you that is relieved you didn’t have to make that decision?_


End file.
